


The Man & Lucy

by theredhoodie



Category: Z Nation (TV)
Genre: Abstract, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Future Fic, Post-Season/Series 03, What-If
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-28
Updated: 2017-04-28
Packaged: 2018-10-24 23:30:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,666
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10752027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theredhoodie/pseuds/theredhoodie
Summary: She didn’t know when she started trusting him. Everything was happening so quickly.He didn’t know just when he started to think of her as more than just a package he had to bring to Zona. He began, somewhere along the line, to protect her for more reason than just because she was his mission.





	The Man & Lucy

**Author's Note:**

> I binged season 3 of Z Nation this week and I have a lot of feelings about these two. They're such an interesting dynamic so I just simplified the last minute of the finale (that was so intense what the hell!) and made this emotional-driven fic. Do with it what you will.

She didn't know when she started trusting him. Everything was happening so quickly. With each aggravation, she found herself older, in new skin that was her skin, and it brought about erratic and fast thoughts until her brain function matched her outsides. It was exhausting.

She knew that she trusted Aunt Addy…even Doc, who killed Annie before she understood the implications of how humans reacted to zombies. Addy had saved her from the zombie-not-zombie in the woods and brought her back to Ma and Pa; Addy knew her Daddy. Addy and The Man fought over her like she was the most precious thing in the world, and if it weren't for the death and panic, she would have been flattered.

No, she couldn't pinpoint the exact moment when she started trusting The Man. Maybe it was when he saved her from the zombies in the mountain who were _wrong_ and _bad_ , the ones that she couldn't stop from attacking them. They weren't her friends; they had no soul inside of them like the others. Maybe it was a bit before then, when they were in that small car and she was directing Grandpa to Addy and Doc so they could find her. She had a feeling he knew what she was doing, but he hadn't stopped her.

He wiped her tears and vowed to stay with her and protect her. No one had ever said anything like that to her who hadn't been bitten and told to do so.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He didn't know just when he started to think of her as more than just a package he had to bring to Zona. He watched her, quite quickly, change from a five year old to a seventeen year old, in a matter of hours. Despite her appearance, and her unholy abilities, she was all too human as her body changed quickly.

Maybe it was when she was suddenly fourteen and he had no choice but to find her chocolate. He was never a people person, but he knew in this situation that he had to bend a little to her whim or he would lose her.

He began, somewhere along the line, to protect her for more reason than just because she was his mission for Zona. The apocalypse was ludicrous enough that a blue-skinned girl who could control zombies became a norm in his life, someone he treated with a kindness he had long since forgotten he had.

He had no choice, however, than to bring her to Zona with him. He knew it would sting, his betrayal of dragging her away from her father, but he knew that Zona needed her and he was still a company man at heart.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Zona was unlike any place she had ever been. It was clean and full of humans, and there were no zombies. She was lonely instantly without the connection to her friends. The people treated her as kindly as doctors could: they stuck her with big needles that hurt, but they only did it twice a day and she was given chocolate and new clothes.

The first time she was put under great stress again was when they thought they had been sneaky, knocking her out with gas, but she wasn't like everyone else. She woke up screaming as they drilled into the bone in her thigh. She screamed, but no zombies came. She screamed until she passed out and she woke up looking twenty years old.

They did it more over the next few weeks. They kept her comfortable, in a room with no windows but with any activities she desired. Puzzles, movies, coloring books. She often asked about The Man but was told she couldn't see him.

He promised her that they would get through whatever Zona had planned _together_ and yet he wasn't there.

Her rage wasn't enough to break away from the compound. She tried once, but was caught in an almost invisible net surrounding the area, jolting her with electricity for twenty minutes before they were able to free her. It made her ache on the inside, but it wasn't enough to fill the void. She spotted The Man in the distance, but he disappeared before she could race toward him.

As the weeks ticked by, she gave up on Addy or Doc or her Daddy or anyone coming to save her. Almost two months after arriving by airship to that glass pool in the middle of the desert, she had aged twelve years to twenty-nine. Her hands and feet were slender, but sturdy. Her hips filled out, as did her chest, and she liked to stand in the mirror and wonder how much she looked like her mother.

Surely she didn't have blue skin like Lucy, and even though Lucy had no idea what Serena looked like, she liked to think they looked a lot a like.

She didn't know what Zona was doing with her, or how much longer she was going to last. She healed quickly, but she had a hollow point in her chest that was constantly growing without contact with her friends, feeding herself with their thoughts and their lives.

Not sure just how long it had been, Lucy was laying on her bed in her very white room, wearing her very white cotton pants and shirt they gave her before she went in for testing each day. She had one arm over her eyes, the other arm hanging off the side of the bed. Her blonde curls were flattened against the pillow.

The door to the room slid open and she didn't move. She didn't want to be stuck with more needles or whatever else they needed to do—take a hunk of skin off her arm, have her pee in a cup, or scrape a cotton swab against the back of her throat.

"You've grown."

It wasn't one of the doctors.

Lucy moved the arm off of her face and her eyes focused on a familiar face. All of his wounds were healed and he was wearing a full suit, but she could still see the black glove that served as a replacement hand under the sleeve.

At seventeen, she felt betrayed that he had abandoned her in this cold, hard place. At twenty-nine, she was thankful to see someone who wasn't wearing a respiratory mask.

"I do that," she said with a shrug, pushing herself up. She rested her back against the wall and slung an arm around her legs, pulling them to her chest.

He took the remaining space on the cot and sat at her feet.

From the looks of it, she was actually catching up to him in age. The thought brought a tiny sliver of something like pride in her chest. A part of her realized that they may be equals now, and a part of her wanted to go back to being a child, when being comforted by him didn't come with implications.

"You broke your promise," she said. He looked at her with those big, bird eyes but she shook her head when he started to speak. "I don't hate you. Anymore. I got over it."

"I had to go away for a little while," he explained without actually explaining anything.

"And what now? Are the doctors finished with me? God, I hope so." She frowned and rubbed her temple before letting one of her arms rest against her knee. Her hand dangled in the air, with light blue palm and tinged, buffed fingernails in her sightline. In the whiteness of the room, she was suddenly very aware that she didn't look like everyone else. The moment was fleeting.

The Man shook his head. "I don't think so. I came to tell you that I'll come see you more often."

She raised her eyebrows at him and they had a mild contest of who could stay quiet the longest. He eventually rustled inside of his suit jacket and pulled out a small book. He handed it to her.

"I don't…were you taught to read?" he asked finally.

Ma and Pa read her kids books, but they were far and few between. "Not really," she said, her grown-up brain blanching at the idea that she could be so ignorant. She had to become stronger, faster, smarter if she was ever going to get out of here.

"Don't worry. I'll teach you."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

He did come back. He came back every day and they started making their way through an old epic story that was all about pride and humility. Lucy stumbled over the title character's name—Gilgamesh—but she soon could read the entire short fable on her own. She learned faster than any human, the sparkle in her eye growing with each new fact that he told her.

She knew nothing but living with zombies and blends and this white room. He told her of the ancient city of Uruk in the long forgotten kingdom of Ur. He told her about temples and gods and how humans used to believe everything they did was because magical beings willed it so.

She ate it up so quickly that they had to move on. He brought her more epics—Aeneid, The Odyssey, Dante's Inferno, Beowulf. She loved tales of supernatural adventure, so he didn't bore her with others. It helped, he thought, take her mind off of the procedures, the room that she was confined to, and forget about her father, who had made his choice.

A month after his first visit, he was on his way to visit her, but the door slid open before he reached it. Lucy walked out with a doctor in all white, a mask obscuring their face.

She saw him and her face brightened, a smile spreading across her features. "Did you bring something new today?"

The doctor looked annoyed.

"Yes," The Man said, patting his chest, which held a bulky package.

She nodded enthusiastically. "Wait for me? I have to go right now."

"I will," he said. And he did. He also watched, for the first time, to see what they did to her. He saw it through a glass window that was dark on his side so Lucy couldn't see him. He saw them skip the anesthetic gas and strap her to the table, her eyes searching the bright ceiling, her hands clenching at her sides.

The scream that ripped from her lungs was unlike the scream she used to call zombies to her. This was pure, unadulterated agony.

He found himself unable to watch.

And then he found himself questioning why he couldn't watch something that simple. He had killed and tortured and done fouler things than that most of his life.

Her scream echoed in his ears until the door to her room slid open. His head snapped up and he watched her sway in the doorway before plastering on another grin and joining him, sitting close so they could read the pages together.

His jacket hung over the back of the chair in the room, the book already in his hands as she settled back against the wall. He had never seen her appear fatigued by physical strife before, but something in her eyes told him that she was feeling the brunt of what Zona was doing to her.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"What do you mean?" He had a feeling she knew exactly what he meant. Even as she hooked her hand around the crook of his elbow and settled her head against his shoulder.

"I heard you scream. I didn't realize they were hurting you so badly." The words stuck in his throat but he got them out.

She shrugged her free shoulder. "You haven't been here," she stated. She trained her eyes toward the black, wordless cover in his hands.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She didn't know why she said it. Just one day, after reading was done, he was standing, stretching from the cramped position she pulled him into so they could read side by side, she had a thought and spoke it, as she often did.

"I want to go outside. I haven't seen the sun in ages," she sighed, weariness coming over her. It wasn't the lack of Vitamin D that was making her feel lethargic; she knew that, but no one cared that she dragged her feet a little more each day. No one cared that they had severed her connection to the world.

He stopped, his gloved hand inches from his suit jacket. It was grey. Sometimes he wore one that was bronze. "I think I can arrange that. Wait here."

"I've got nowhere else to be," she called after him as he left the room in a hurry. She wasn't expecting anything to come of it, so she sat back, clasped her hands together and closed her eyes.

She jerked awake when he arrived a little while later. She squinted up at him as he walked closer and held out a hand.

"What's this?" she asked.

"I'm taking you outside."

When she ran, that one time she got away, it had been night, and she had twisted her ankle and skinned her arm before being stuck in an electric net. It hadn't been pleasant. This time, she walked next to The Man, her hand hooked on his arm, walking through doors with security codes that she couldn't bypass herself, up and up out of the depths of this medical prison, until she could see the sun blazing through floor-to-ceiling windows. It was so bright that she had to put her hand up and squint until her eyes adjusted.

She stepped onto sun-soaked concrete, eating up the burn on the bottoms of her bare feet. There was no one else around. No one swimming in the pool, no one bathing in the sun. She wondered if they were all scared of her or if they had all died except for the doctors.

Lucy let go of his arm, knowing she wasn't going to be able to run, and stepped directly into the sun. She tilted her head back and tossed her arms out to the sides. She may not be human, but that didn't mean she didn't thrive under sunlight. It warmed her deeply, seeping into her skin.

"I've missed this," she said. Just months ago she spent most of her days outside with Ma and Pa.

Smiling into the big ball of gas in the sky—The Man had been quickly supplying her with interesting facts, including information about the world and the solar system, which she found astounding—she eventually felt her eyeballs grow too warm and she saw white spots on the backs of her eyelids. Tilting her head toward the ground, she blinked and got readjusted.

She wished there was grass around for her to dig her toes into.

Instead, she searched around for the only other person outside. He was leaning against a railing that was mostly glass, with a metal bar around the top. She joined him. They were up very high, and there was nothing around them. No trees, no lakes, no zombies.

"I want to get out of here," she said quietly, resting her forearms on the railing and watching him out of the corner of her eye.

A muscle in his jaw twitched. "That's not an option."

She ignored it, allowing her imagination to wander. "We could travel across the country, helping zombies."

"That is not what I do."

"I want to be out there," she tried again. "With you. I hate being stuck here. Either they got what they needed out of me already or these super scientists are all idiots." The good mood she acquired from the sun was quickly dimming.

"Zona will find us wherever we go."

Was he actually humoring her?

"Aren't they all dying anyway?" She hated the bitterness in her voice, but they hurt her over and over again. They were not her friends.

"Maybe."

She sighed and stared out in front of them at the vast expanse of nothingness. "I miss my friends."

"Who? Addison?"

"No. The zombies. I feel like I'm…withering on the inside without them." She had told no one this. Not even the doctors the few times that they did a 'physical' on her to make sure she was still regenerating and healing.

He turned and looked at her. She couldn't bear to look at him though, and kept her gaze forward.

"Does anyone know about this?" Of all of the people to care about her, of course it had to be the mercenary who tore her away from her family. The worst part was that she couldn't even blame him for that or anything that happened since. If anything, she blamed her father for leaving her.

"No." She closed her eye and sucked in a breath. Usually she could feel them, even if they were far away, but there were none close enough for her to reach. "They're a part of me. I don't know why. I'm not a scientist or a doctor. I just _know_ what I _feel_." She fisted her hand and lightly hammered over her heart.

She hadn't realized she was crying until she felt his thumb brush a tear away. He took her by the shoulders and turned her toward him.

"How bad it is?"

She blinked, his form blurry in front of her. "I feel like I could die," she whispered.

His face softened for a short moment and he pulled her toward him. She was still shorter than him, and tucked herself under his chin, tightening her arms around him. He would protect her; he had to. He promised.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two days later, in the dead of night, when the doctors were asleep and the others were in their drug induced comas, The Man slipped through four levels of security to the small room that housed Lucy. He had a bag slung over his shoulder, and was dressed for travel: cargo pants, boots, vest. He put his hand on the seamless door and it slid open, revealing a dark room inside.

"Who's there?" Lucy asked, her voice slurred with sleep.

"It's me," he whispered, breaking and waving around a hefty glow stick until it lit the room in dull orange light. "Get dressed. Quickly."

She took one look at him and the bag in his hand and did as she was told. She stripped out of the comfortable white clothes without a word and pulled on a pair of pants, socks and boots, a long sleeved shirt and a vest for warmth. She pulled her blonde curls back and tied them, something she rarely did. It felt odd, but it made her feel more complete, more grown up. And she was grown up, no matter that she had been born a year and a half ago.

Once she was done, she turned to him. "What are we doing?"

"Getting you out of here." He tossed her the bag in his hand and shoved the flash into his cargo pants pockets. The straps of the bag on his back cut into his wide shoulders, but there were two of them, so they needed all the supplies they could carry.

She didn't say anything else, though her mind whirled. She followed him silently through the security points. She wanted desperately to ask where the security was.

He didn't tell her that _he_ was the security at night here.

They left the perfectly kept house, the pool, the invisible bannisters. He led her to a gate in the fencing around the house she would have overlooked on her own and they slipped through thanks to his clearance.

"Run," he said quietly, his mouth close to her ear, as he shoved the glow stick in her hand to give her some light. He jogged and she easily kept up, even with the backpack on. Her limbs rejoiced in the exercise after being stuck in a tiny room for so much time.

She followed him to a car hidden in the shadows of a stone arch. He opened the driver's seat and tossed his bag into the back. "The trunk's full of gas; should get us pretty far." He tapped the roof. "Solar power should get us a bit farther."

"Tracking devices?" she asked as she put her own bag in the back seat and got inside. They closed their doors simultaneously.

He looked over at her and arched an eyebrow in an expression that said 'What do you take me for?'

She grinned sheepishly at him.

"Let's go. I want to get as many miles between us and them as we can before sun up." He didn't gun it, but he drove quickly and quietly until they were far enough away for him to rev up the engine and really get them going.

"Where are we going?" she asked, clicking in her seatbelt.

"As far away as we can."

"If we find anyone else…Addy, Doc…my dad…" she trailed off. Did she even want to find them? Maybe, if they could keep her from Zona. She guessed they had what they needed from her. Maybe they wouldn't even come after them.

The Man shrugged. "If we do, we'll deal with it then. Right now, my first priority is getting you to zombie populated country."

She smiled, a real genuine thing and reached out to squeeze his wrist, resting on the gearshift. "Thank you."

He didn't say anything, nor did he take his eyes off of the makeshift road in front of them, but there may have been a ghost of a smile flitter across his lips. Or maybe she was just woozy from all of the running.

Lucy settled back in the seat and closed her eyes. She was free, for now. She never wanted to be confined again. And she was entirely happy to have The Man at her side.

He would protect her. He made a promise.

**Author's Note:**

> *I'll be good by Jaymes Young plays in the background*


End file.
